Hail to the hangmen

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This critic is impressed by the intelligence behind the RA’s summer show

SUMMER EXHIBITION Royal Academy of Arts

AN EXHIBITION which ranges in generation and approach from Leonard Rosoman to Damien Hirst could be accused of many things, including mindless eclecticism and out-and-out incoherence. But you could hardly deny its enterprise and variety. Especially if it happens to be the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition for 2004 — the 236th of its line, though this year you have to look very carefully to find this out.

Maybe the academy does not want us, any more, to be too conscious of the great, glorious and finally obfuscating tradition behind it. For the past five